


A Second Time

by Nym



Series: Broken Wheel [2]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-03
Updated: 2014-12-03
Packaged: 2018-02-28 00:47:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2712800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nym/pseuds/Nym
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Busy trying to engineer the curse to end all curses, Rumple is increasingly <em>distracted</em> by his budding romance with Belle.</p><p>
  <em>His heart? Is pain. Is Bae, always. Is Belle, whether he willed it or not. The time has come and gone when he might have had the strength to send her away and have done with it. He only hopes that he has enough left to let her go.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Second Time

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Luthien for beta-reading!
> 
>  
> 
> **None of my fanfiction may be reposted or otherwise shared elsewhere, including translations and audio recordings, unless you have my written consent. Using my occasional original ideas/characters in your own fanfic, to make your _own_ words or art or whatever, is fine with me.**

Perhaps it was a mistake to give her a whole library?

Since then he's hardly seen her, though her hands continue to shape his Dark Castle into something less dark and more homely. There are glimpses of his lady-love and there are smiles, but lately they've become hasty. Hasty as her footsteps as she turns a corner before he can catch her eye.

Rumpelstiltskin frets. He has work to do, a queen to steer towards her meeting with destiny, but instead of attending to that he paces in his tower. He misses Belle, and the enormity of that angers him, so he bares his teeth at the sullen silence and he waits. Waiting is in his very blood. It's a skill that he's mastered to the point of being able to pretend that it's the same thing as patience. He'll wait a thousand lifetimes to see Bae's smile again, no problem there, but a week without Belle's eager embrace and he's lost. Pacing, snarling at shadows and fouling up spells because the want of her chips away at his concentration.

He watches her, of course. A crystal ball, a cup of tea – he sneaks surface glimpses of her and finds her reading. Always reading. She did that before, of course – before she seduced him with her wanton honesty. What possessed him to make her a _library?_ If he has a rival for Belle's heart then it is ink on a page. At first he contents himself with the thought that, whatever the written word does for her heart, only he can coax her body to the heights of delight. After a few days more, the fact merely adds a smarting indignity to her continued absence from his bed.

Belle's smiles grow stranger and the glimpses of her rarer. Rumple catches himself searching her eyes for any lack of sincerity, for accusation, for revulsion. He finds only Belle, newly placid and somehow commanding in her maturity. Until so recently he thought of her as _girl,_ as _child._ It is most definitely _woman_ who regards him so strangely and disappears among her books for days on end. He cannot fathom her. He craves her as he's craved nothing in all these long years.

That she no longer considers herself his servant is clearly understood between them. Rumple was perfectly happy with the new arrangement when she appeared to desire nothing more than his kisses, his cock and his patient instruction in the art of mutual pleasure. He could not help himself – the library had been a whim, a boastful gift that was yet a considerate one considering the woman's natural inclinations. He'd not expected to lose her to it; only to amuse her and to please her. Belle's gratitude is as generous as her other attributes and she rode him hard, twice in quick succession, there in the library itself and then again on his spinning stool with her breasts bared to the brazen moonlight.

He'd just grown used to that – to her curiosity, her fire and her tireless, marvellous lust. It makes him feel alive that she desires him; now she doesn't, and Rumple feels a dead weight inside. He wants. To his dismay he wants more than her flesh, more than her lust; he aches for the light of laughter in her eyes and for the moments when, their passion spent, they are comfortable together in a closed world of small touches and wordless sounds.

The impossible creature! No, the library wasn't the mistake. Allowing himself ever to fall for her pretty charms was the mistake! How is he supposed to do his work while he thinks of her squealing beneath him, perspiration darkening the hair that clings to her skin? How can he make plans when his every stray thought leads back to _Belle?_

In a moment he resolves to send her away. Back to her father, yes, and then...

No. He may be uncertain about where their deal stands but she belongs to him in quite another way now. She whispers as much when they're together; she pants it by way of encouraging him to greater feats between her thighs; groans it as he drags her trembling body to a peak of blissful torment before they subside together, sated. She is _his_ and wishes to be so. What madman would throw that away merely because it inconvenienced his plans?

Yes. Belle should stay. He likes the way she breezes about the place. He's not some cur who tires of a woman in a few short weeks; he can't simply throw her over because she enjoys a good book. More than his company, apparently.

He crumples another sheet of parchment where the hesitation of his quill has ruined yet another spell.

Magic is concentration. Power, yes, and emotion too, but above all it is concentration and _control._ Rumple is certain that he possessed all of them a little while ago – enough to slave his emotions to his will, his will to his ambition. Now even his flesh betrays him, his cock thickening at the thought of Belle while his mind wanders, slave to a frustrated need.

His own touch no longer meets that need. It cannot even blunt the edge, try as he might with pleasure potions that would leave a mortal man insensible. Those efforts only leave Rumple feeling vaguely ashamed of himself for being so weak, so lacking in patience, and it is shame that finally drives him from his own castle to check on plans that are already in motion, and to meddle where he need not.

That doesn't satisfy him either. Not even the sight of Regina in rags, trying to mingle with her subjects. To get close enough to snap Snow White's neck, so she says, but Rumple knows her better than that. She's looking to find out what the common people truly think of her, and to pick at the festering sore of their loyalty to Snow. Well, she'll not like the answer. Looking for love in _all_ the wrong places, that one. He's seen to it personally that there are no right ones – that when Regina has nowhere left to turn she will turn to _him._ She usually does. It seems to run in her family.

It comes as a nasty shock when he returns to the castle days later, peevish and somewhat footsore, and finds Belle entertaining the disguised Queen to tea. Regina is sitting in _his_ fireside chair, still robed in rags and stinking to high heaven. Belle rises to greet him, a parade of expressions crossing her features and showing everything from relief to annoyance. Regina stays where she is, one leg extended and the foot resting on a cushion upon a stool.

How much has Regina said? And about what? Rumple pushes restless hands behind his back and clasps them there, regarding the women coolly.

"Letting in the peasants now, are we?"

"I thought that no-one was too lowly to make one of your deals," Belle teases, reminding him of an idle boast, weeks ago; of how her hands tugged and tore at his clothing not so very long before that, before he had her against the wall of the winding staircase. It's all there in her voice to put him off his stride, and the little minx knows it. "Besides, it's never wise to judge a person by their appearance. This is Wilma. She says that she needs to speak with you very urgently." She sends a meaningful look in Regina's direction, lending a slight stress to the assumed name, before catching Rumple's eye and making certain that he has noted her warning.

Oh! Clever. She's _clever._ It's one of the things he finds so irresistible about her. _One_ of the things. The others are pressing themselves into his awareness even as he notes her cleverness and nods his understanding.

"I was actually going by the distinctive aroma," he says, waving a hand in front of his nose. Regina glowers, getting up with less than her usual grace. She's limping and her skirt is bloodstained. The peasants seem to have possessed sharp things aplenty, even if they had no soap. "Get it out of here, do."

"You know who I am!" Regina stomps towards him, limping heavily, and stops with her hands on her hips and her lips set in a snarl. "You said that I had only to call your name when I wanted this damned _spell_ taken off me!"

"I said you could call," Rumple says, brightly, pointing at her. "Didn't said I'd answer." He grins, pleased with himself, while Regina's nostrils flare with her fury.

Belle rolls her eyes as he continues to toy with Regina, and turns away to gather the tea things onto a silver tray. Even the rattle of crockery and silverware reminds him of how he wants her; the merry sound of it once accompanied their fucking on the long table, until they fell off and kept on going on the carpet below, with Belle astride him and flushed with exertion. It's all he can do to push the image from his mind, keep his eyes from following Belle's every movement, and force himself to deal with the Queen.

Well, she's easily dealt with. Only once she has admitted that the peasants loathe her does he remove the glamour. Her resignation really is music to his ears, even if the tune is soured by his awareness of Belle's disapproval. The people will never love Queen Regina, but they already fear her. It's so easy to give her the next little nudge into the darkness, and then off she goes, out into the world, wound up with a burning purpose that she thinks is all her own. And it's all _his._

Rumple should clap his hands, twirl with glee. _Something_ in the way of gloating seems in order as Regina sweeps out the door, a Queen once more, but her backwards glance at Belle chills his blood. That scarlet smile is too knowing, those dark eyes narrowed too cruelly. Regina _knows._

It's all he can do not to hurl a fireball after her. He makes a fist so tight that his nails draw blood from his palm, and his expression alarms even Belle, who usually giggles if he overplays his malevolence. But he isn't playing now. The blood-lust blinds him, robbing him of breath, while Belle stares at him from beside the fire.

"I didn't let her in," she says, uncertainly. "She walked in as if she owns the place, past all your traps and tricks. I thought I'd better play along and see what she wanted."

Now he's frightened and upset her, his lady-love, his sweet obsession. And yes, he is angry with her for being in danger, for being here in his castle, for _existing_ , but it's Regina's throat he wants to squeeze until he feels the struggles stop.

Even as Belle speaks, her fear becomes a kind of hurt reproach. "I didn't know when you'd be back. You didn't say goodbye."

A spark of guilt drives the darkness back. He watches her, baffled, as she comes nearer and carefully takes him by the hand, cupping it between both of her own like a cherished thing. Rumple cannot think of murder when she does that. He cannot think of anything but how warm and soft her skin is and how blue her eyes. She takes his breath away.

"I didn't think you'd miss me. Not with so many books to read."

Belle drops his hand and falls back a step. Rumple can feel it all teetering on the brink of going wrong, just as it always goes wrong when he opens himself to love, and the laughter of his curse echoes from the wounded hollows of his old heart.

Her smile is all wrong, as is the way she keeps her distance instead of... Instead of throwing herself at him. He liked that. She's always so definite about everything, whether it's tearing off his shirt or explaining why he should eat the burnt meal she just placed in front of him. When she disapproves of his behaviour she simply tells him so, often with her hands on her hips and her chin jutting while her eyes flash daggers of scorn. And all of it is not because she thinks him unworthy, but because she believes such behaviour to be unworthy of _him._ He finds it rather flattering when it isn't scaring the hell out of him.

There isn't any of that now. He's seeing her vacillate when she's always been so _sure_. He tried to scare her out of it when first he brought her to the castle; he tried to tear it away, thinking that it could only be a mask. She quickly proved that while he could frighten her, anger her, disappoint her or dismay her, he could not prove her false in anything.

Here and now he can sense the words unspoken. She betrays herself with a stiff silence that hides a truth from him.

Anger comes first, unbidden and always ready to crush the betrayer of his heart. He's been prepared for that and catches it, deflects it with impatience, knowing himself for what he is. Belle insists that he's no monster, when they find the breath to speak of such things. And she's wrong about that, oh yes, but there's something so irresistible about her expectations of him. Monster he is and monster he will remain, but he need not always behave like one.

While Rumple is still wrestling with confusion, with the darkness that mocks his every effort at playing the lover, Belle finally finds the words she's been struggling for.

"Who is she?"

"That?" He points both fingers in the direction Regina just took, studying Belle's upturned face for any clue as to what she's thinking. "Is Regina. The grieving widow of King Leopold."

"She comes and goes as she pleases?" Her face contorts itself so when she's puzzled. Even that charms him. "Are you and she..." She stops short. He stares at her. He sees the apprehension take hold of her that she asked him no questions and demanded no promises before offering herself as his lover. She has no claim on him save that she is... _herself._ And that he suspects he might gladly trade away the world to secure her happiness.

Doesn't she know that?

"It's not like that." Is it some magic that softens his voice when he speaks to her? Is it the same magic that makes her part her lips when she hears him soften for her? She makes it so difficult to think clearly. "She is..." Every term that presents itself for the use of his tongue is bitter with venom or honeyed with mockery. Rumple keeps his teeth clenched until he's found a better one. "My protégé " He feels his predatory smile creeping back to where it belongs, carrying his voice with it into crisp cruelty. "My pupil. My problem."

"And me?" Belle's voice hasn't changed. She stands there, vulnerable in a way that tortures him. He cannot bear that she wavers when she has been so very, very certain of what she wants. "What am I?"

What is she? Lover, yes, with a lust in her that sears his soul, and light in a life where none belongs. Beauty, balm and constant temptation. Torment and tease, ever since he gave her that damned room full of books.

Rumple cocks his head, watching her in a way that makes most mortals turn away or run for their lives. Belle only blinks at him, her eyes like pools of pain, and he has to clench his fists again to keep from being the one who runs. He never wanted this.

"You're Belle." He touches her cheek then snatches his hand back, not trusting himself to merely brush aside a strand of hair. He wants to drag her against his body and kiss her mouth, and he can't do that. _That_ was the nature of this new bargain. Belle chose. Belle chooses. Only Belle. His willingness to be the object of her carnal desire is inked between all the unwritten lines, but the terms of the deal are hers.

"Master or lover. She asked me which you are."

"And?" The question piques his interest, he has to admit.

Belle stares at him, her jaw slackening in shock, and then she turns and runs for the door with a muffled sob.

What? What _is_ it? What has he _done?!_

Back stiff and teeth clenched, Rumple strides across to his wheel and sits. It wouldn't surprise him if he spun treacle instead of gold, unbalanced as he is by the woman's whims. But gold thread comes and his tension unwinds, and he lets himself muse upon the implications of Regina's visit as the wheel turns.

After a while, the rhythmical creak-creak of the old wood penetrates his consciousness and puts him in mind of the sound made by the couch in the library when they fuck on it.

Groaning his dismay, ignoring his growing excitement, Rumple watches the coarse cord he was making become as narrow and as smooth as silk. He's never spun finer gold. Never. Even his magic humbles itself before the memory of how it feels to be with Belle.

As always, he takes advantage of the unexpected, filling two spools with thread that's worth a king's ransom for its purity and strength. Such a novelty to hold the image of her in his mind while he works instead of trying to banish her. Afterwards he unwinds a length of the thread and holds it stretched between his hands, staring at it half unseeing.

 _Master or lover?_ Is that it?

There's love between them. It's real enough that he feels it tug at the magic of his curse when she kisses him. It's tentative enough that he can brush its power aside with a thought. He supposes that a whisper of it is captured in the thread. Love, perhaps, but drawn out as thin as can be.

He could break it with his bare hands.

And as for master... Hells! Does she think herself bought and paid for while she lies with him?! When her very willingness, her unabashed eagerness, her warm _acceptance_ is the drug he craves beyond measure?! He'll not stand for that!

His pride is smarting. It's but a step from there to anger – at her, at fate, at his weakness in ever allowing his head to be turned when he knows how it must end. No-one chooses to be with him forever. He never thought that he would find himself thankful for every single moment that a woman will grant him. It's pathetic! It's unworthy of him. It's a complication that he does not need in his complicated life. Yet from the moment she first stood and faced him with resolute optimism and uncompromising kindness, Rumple has wanted her near him. The part of him that shrinks in terror from all tender feeling is a double coward in the face of Belle's cheerful courage.

Has he wronged her simply by accepting what she offered him? Rumple long ago ceased to trouble himself with right and wrong, concentrating instead on what is necessary and expedient. Bringing Belle to his castle was neither one of those; bedding her even less so. She has been changing the rules by which he plays from the moment she entered the game. Far from resenting her, Rumple catches himself longing to _deserve_ her.

At war with himself, Rumple goes to her. He tosses a spool of the new thread from hand to hand while he climbs the winding stairs.

She'll be in the library. She always is. The bed chamber he provided for her is a study in pale opulence, all spotless cream satin, white fur trim and golden highlights. It would shame the living quarters of a princess, and the giving of it made for an extravagant gesture when she had slept a while in his dungeon, but it has never suited Belle. The woman herself is dyed in richer hues, and like calls to like. The library is walnut brown and wine red; it is shadows and dust; it is yellow sunbeams in the morning and the orange glow of a hearth and beeswax candles in the evening. All she has there for her comfort is a couch, the one that creaks so, but she chooses to be among the books rather than return to her comfortable bed.

Suppose she's still weeping? Rumple grimaces, and hesitates with his foot about to land on the first of the winding steps up to the library. The mere thought of it gives him an unwelcome pang in the chest. He cannot stand to see her cry, though he's hard pressed to explain why. He tried to enjoy her misery when first he brought her to his dungeon, but it was an empty victory when finally she succumbed to her grief. If her sobs brought him no smug satisfaction then, they'll surely be a knife in his chest now that he knows her strength. Belle doesn't snivel over trifles, nor out of fear, nor for dramatic effect; only the deepest passions of her heart can move her from her steady centre. What is he supposed to say to her if her sweet, round cheeks are still wet?

Belle is asleep. His first reaction is abject relief that he need not face her tears. A moment later he is struck anew by her beauty, then by the unfamiliarity of seeing her so still as in sleep. She lies among the cushions on the couch, a small book open on her breast and caught beneath her arm. One silver shoe has slipped from her foot and dangles from her right toe, ready to drop to the floorboards and wake her at her slightest movement.

Breathless, tiptoeing like a thief, Rumple lifts the shoe away and stands over the couch, unable to remember why he came here. He doesn't pursue her. Belle seeks him out. That way he can be certain, always certain, that the choice is hers.

He turns to go, forgetting himself and allowing his boot to scuff against the floor as he moves.

"Rumple?" Even her voice can stir his blood. Husky with sleep, it reminds him of the way she sounds when her lust is all spent; when she curls herself against his side and says his name, content. She makes a puzzled sound, pushing herself up to sitting. "What are you going to do with that?"

It is a moment before Rumple understands that she refers to the shoe in his hand. He feels his smile twist awkwardly, false and desperate. There is no-one else alive who can embarrass the Dark One.

"Nothing."

Her puzzlement charms him – the way her brows draw together slightly, amusement and curiosity held in a momentary stillness that no portrait painter could hope to capture. Then she shakes her head. She has learned that it is fruitless to question his oddities. Somehow, in spite of all, she has decided to trust in his good intentions.

Until he met her, Rumple was unaware that he had any. Sheepish, he hands her back the shoe.

"What's the matter?" Strangely, it's easier to talk to her when she's already wrong-footed him to the point of blushing. "You've been avoiding me for weeks."

Belle purses her lips, contorting where she sits to slip her shoe back on. Then she sits up straight and places her hands on her thighs, staring at the floor beside his boots.

"I haven't."

He scratches the back of his neck, twisting the spool of thread between the fingers of his other hand. What is he supposed to say now? He was never good at this – at fathoming the complexities of a woman upset with him. It's one of many reasons to love her; that she simply speaks her mind, too open to dissemble.

"But—"

"I've been here. You never came looking for me." There's no warning chill to her tone and no hint of anger. Belle speaks quietly, deliberately, and her very composure somehow emphasises how _hurt_ she is.

Rumple dies a little inside. His instinct is to respond with a shower of words and reassurance, of apology and excuses and pretentious gifts. For once he is thankful for the terrible dignity of his position; it prevents him from making such an abject fool of himself. Cold calculation cuts in and allows him time to _think_.

"I... I didn't know that would be welcome," he ventures, so carefully. "You've always been very clear about your... desires." He half-smiles at a recollection: _'No-one decides my fate but me.'_ Magnificent. Who was he to argue? "No-one decides but you." He reaches out to her, meaning to touch her cheek, but stops just shy of his fingers brushing skin. So it was when she offered him her body; the clear understanding that it was hers to give and nobody's to take from her. Rumpelstiltskin will twist the wording of any other deal to a perverse breaking point, and he'll mock the fool who calls him unfair, but he has no wish to take anything from Belle that is not freely given. Never. "Tell me what you want."

"I want to know what _you_ want!" She doesn't shout, but her head snaps up and she wrings her hands in her lap, furious with him. "I want to know where I stand!"

"Wherever you like!" It's reflex to snap, to bite, to turn away before she sees how she can humble him. He does so and then is sorry for it, and then is angry because she can make him feel shame. "You bed me or you don't. You sweep and dust or you read your books. Whatever you want! Why this? Why now?" He squeezes the forgotten spool of gold thread so hard that he feels the wood snap and a splinter pierce his palm.

"Because I need to know." Her measured tone has softened with feeling; she regrets that she has upset him. Anyone else would be afraid of what he might do to them. Belle is only sad that there is misunderstanding and hurt, even as she feels wronged herself. "I thought you'd come to me eventually. That you'd want me too much to stay away. But you didn't come, and then you went away without a word."

Light dawns. It is not a welcome revelation. That... that _torment_ of being denied her, of seeing her every day and beyond his reach – that was a _test?_ When he has measured his worthiness against the opposite standard – congratulated himself upon his restraint and his respect for her person, and ached for her until he was half afraid he'd lose his mind to it? The minx has been _testing_ him and finding him wanting?!

He'd likely kill anyone else for presuming as much. Even as his darkest urge rises on the swift tide of indignation he knows it for what it is and spits on it, permitting himself a moment of loathing for what he has become. The light that Belle shines upon his heart shows up something better, something he thought crushed to death lifetimes ago when his son called him _coward._ Belle thought to look for it and to coax it out with kindness; with humour; with compassion that never stank of pity. Rumpelstiltskin is a monster who kills, oh yes, but he is a man who loves. He loves this woman no less because she terrifies him with her expectations.

"I see." He cannot manage grace as well; his tone is gruff, his shoulders hunched defensively, his back to her while he wrestles with his innate mistrust and wins a fragile victory. A victory for love. "Well, I'm here now."

"Can't you tell me what's in your heart?" She pleads without reproach; she makes it sound so reasonable a proposition.

His heart? Is pain. Is Bae, always. Is Belle, whether he willed it or not. The time has come and gone when he might have had the strength to send her away and have done with it. He only hopes that he has enough left to let her go.

"Love. And fear. And darkness such as you cannot imagine." Rumple turns around abruptly and stabs a bloodied finger towards her in something like accusation. "I thought that you were happy."

"I was. I mean, I could be."

Does that honesty cost her? He's wondered occasionally, and wonders now. Does it take all of her self-control to face him with that open countenance, and to let him stare deeply into her eyes in search of truths? Hypnotised by the unblinking blue, Rumple lowers his hand as Belle rises. A moment later she has taken the crushed reel of thread from his bleeding hand, drawn the silk cravat from his throat and wrapped it around his palm. Then she holds his hand, cradling it as though such an injury mattered in the least. It is the sort of gentle consideration with which she breaks him, over and over.

For the first time he's quite sure that she doesn't mean to, any more than she taxes him with this unhappiness of hers merely to elicit guilt. It is not his shame that she requires, nor his apology for causing her this grief. She wants them to grope together in this murk of uncertainty until they find some way forward.

He's never been good at that.

"Master... or lover." He tries the words aloud and knows them for the meddling mischief that the witch meant them to be. As if those are Belle's only options. Regina's understanding of the world never did have much room for subtleties. Belle looks away, reddening, but she nods and bites her lip. She doesn't let go of his hand. "I thought that our actions spoke for themselves."

"Yes. So did I. But now I need to know." She sounds as if she's sorry for it. Damn Regina! Belle meets his gaze again and her eyes are filling with tears. "Please tell me where I stand."

"I was never your master." He pulls his hand away, afraid that his growing bitterness will sting her. "Your jailer, perhaps, but not since that day in the tower when you chose to make me your lover." It sounds no better. Not when he knows that she gave her word to go with him forever, and that she would never break her word. He ought to have begged her for forever on his knees, right there in the tower when first they claimed one another's flesh. "And then unwilling to tell you that you were free because I was sure that you would go."

Rumple awaits the slap, the shove, the scream – the accusations of a woman deceived by his omission and defiled by his touch ever since. He owes her that, when he's loved her, and so braces himself to restrain the murderous rage that will rise up to shield him from the agony of it. Instead, Belle sobs as she did before; suddenly and thickly, incapable of stopping herself. The heart that he was already trying to harden in his chest gives a lurch of sick dread. To see her weep would be true punishment, worse than any word or blow, but then she throws her arms around his neck and clings for dear life, and the only name that he can find for her outburst is... relief?

"Rumple," she whispers, her lips against his jaw. "I'm sorry. I had to be sure. You play with words and with people and... I had to be _sure_ that this was as real for you as for me. I'm so sorry."

Lost, staring past her shoulder while his mind tries to fathom her breathless stream of words, Rumple steadies her with his hands against her back. He clasps her a little nearer, and notes that the ever-mocking voice of the darkness has fallen silent. It has no answer to this, to the incomprehensibility of _Belle_ , but it manages to look for somebody to blame and to punish for his discomfiture.

"Because of what Regina said?" It sounds ridiculous as he says it. Belle has put up with him for three seasons; his quips, his taunts, his tempers, his sulks, his evasions and his every effort to put her in fear of the Dark One's wrath. He prides himself that someone so persistently unruffled by _him_ is unlikely to be shaken by Regina's clumsy meddling.

"No." Belle frees herself with a snuffling little laugh, dragging her wrist across her cheeks and then wiping it on her skirts. The muted laugh becomes a chuckle, a shake of her head, then she walks over to the window, unsteady on her feet and wearing that smile he's seen so often lately. She opens the window and lifts her face to the breeze of a long summer evening. Even blowing her nose on a soggy handkerchief and confusing the hell out of him, she fills him with fire. And hope.

 _Danger,_ warns the dark. _Beware. Love is weakness. Love is loss. Love is betrayal._ Rumple toys with the idea of a spell that might rip that voice of mockery clean out of him and allow him to confront it in a storm of bloody vengeance. He's had enough of being mocked by a curse – one that has to borrow his own voice, at that.

 _If I should let it,_ he thinks, taking care to direct each word towards the pit of his soul where the magic coils, _her kiss would destroy you. Be. Silent._

He smirks coldly at himself for threatening a curse. They need one another, he and it, and even if a reckoning is possible then it lies a long way off. It is as much a part of him now as thought, blood and bones, and if he's to see his son again he cannot part with it. Even so, he fancies that the voice of mistrust and mockery grows a little fainter while he watches his lady-love compose herself in the twilight. Her kiss _could_ slay the beast, if he but let it, and for the first time that knowledge feels like power instead of terror.

"Belle?" Rumple goes to her. Touches her shoulder. Fills up with relief when she turns and there are no tears. "Why then? If you were happy as things were?"

Her answering smile is strained. She touches his arm, then hesitates and withdraws, then takes him by the hands instead and looks determined.

"Because it's not just me any more." Her fingers tighten convulsively, her palms growing suddenly damp with sweat. He can feel her fear and see her courage as she meets his gaze. "I'm going to have a child."

After the frozen moment that follows, and in answer to his ungracious, staring silence, Belle shakes her head slightly and squeezes his hands until the splinter makes him wince. _"Our_ child," she explains, gently deadpan, and shames him forever with her tolerant certainty that he wasn't sure.

Belle looks mortified when he grabs for the arch of the window, lurching past her to support himself against the stone before his knees fail him. Only then does his body drag in a breath of air denied too long; it is a groaning gasp that causes Belle to cover her mouth with her hands, frightened for him and, though she pushes it aside in a heartbeat and reaches out to him, for herself.

 _No. Not for herself._ Dizzy, Rumple pulls her body against his and clutches at her back, at the back of her neck where the soft hair escapes her artless ponytail. He closes his eyes and rubs those stray strands between thumb and forefinger, twirling a few together into a cool and soothing bundle.

"A child?" That voice is his.

"Yes." Belle's voice is muffled. He looks down. He has crushed her so close to him that she cannot lift her head to speak. With painful self-mastery, Rumple loosens his arms and lets her straighten, and stares at her because he is incapable of deciding to do anything else. "I know it's a bit of a shock." She pats his chest, then leads him into the room and pats the scrolling wood that rises up at one end of the couch. Somehow, Rumple comprehends that she wishes him to sit. He sits.

He's taken considerable pains to prevent children. Since the first time.

Since then.

He's clutching at her skirt as though afraid that she will give up on him and go away before he is able to say the right thing. For the moment, everything is a scream inside him – every possible emotion rushing together into a meaningless cry that he cannot even voice. It thunders in his blood to the rhythm of his hammering heart.

One clear notion manages to surface from beneath the flood.

"You're... well?" He tips his head back to see her face. Belle nods, her worried face brightening with a little smile. Rumple nods. His tongue might as well be a lump of cold lead for all the use it seems to be. "Good. That's good." He nods again. Belle's smile widens and her inexplicable fondness for him wipes away the furrows of uncertainty with its warmth. She strokes the hair at his temple, the sensation creating space for another clear and isolated thought; how he has missed her touch.

Then another thought, this one propelling him to his feet in a rush. "You should be the one sitting down!"

Laughing, a new and private joy adding fresh colours to her light, Belle swats his arm.

"I don't need to sit down. I'm not broken." With that, Belle takes hold of his bandaged hand and lifts it for a closer look, unwrapping the pale silk. Although he could heal the tiny wound with barely an effort of magic, Rumple stands quite still and watches her pluck out the sharp little splinter with the nails of her thumb and forefinger. Then she kisses the place to take the sting away and goes back to smiling at him, coy now. "I've been looking in all these books. Not one of them says if it's all right to make love while the baby is growing." She puts her hand to her belly, pressing in the skirts. "I hope so," she says, all sincerity and conviction. "It's really hard to stop once you start, isn't it?"

Rumple can't even speak. The sound he makes for 'yes' is nearer a gulp. His hands shake when he reaches out for her, then the trembling passes to his entire body when he draws her close and kisses her. He cannot help himself; not now. He's never dared to claim so much as a kiss without her leave, but if he doesn't kiss her he'll have to start to think again, and he knows what doubts and dark fears will be born when that happens.

A moment for this, first.

Belle moans as their mouths touch, hands sliding greedily up his arms to bury themselves in his hair. In her moan he hears the same longing that he's endured these past weeks, so he kisses her and kisses her as they've never kissed before, long and thorough, determined to share this moment of trembling triumph with his lady-love before he lets the questions come. To his smug satisfaction, Belle pleads for more before his own restraint is in danger of failing him, but he stills her hands when she begins to pull at his clothing.

Hot, flushed and trusting, Belle lets him lift her onto the couch and settle her among the scattered cushions with exaggerated care. To be slow with her, to be selfless and to linger over every beautiful inch of her at last – oh, it's a gift! He thought he understood the terms of their deal; that hasty satisfaction was what she desired of him. Her initial bemused smile gives place to a misty eyed tenderness, and then to sobs and whimpers, as he shows her how very, very patient he can be. He does not mean to fail a second time at being the lover his beloved Belle desires and deserves.

He cannot allow himself to fail for a second time at being a father. Rumple knows that in his bones as he clings with Belle afterwards; after the soft and slow loving that filled her library with moans and, only eventually, the slow creaking of the couch beneath them. He's conjured a blanket to wrap her in, his Belle, and once again listened to her laugh and declare that she isn't broken. She isn't broken, and she's strong and fierce and marvellous, but surely she'll allow that she's doubly precious now?

When he can bear it, Rumple eases himself from her side and leaves her to sleep. He feels new, refreshed, and just for the moment there is room for awe where the fear usually haunts his soul. Soon he will have to live the fear again, to think of his first child and of the gaping, uncertain future. But Rumpelstiltskin is never wasteful – not even of a moment's respite. He conjures his wheel rather than leave the library, and watches over Belle while he sits and spins his gratitude and his love and a handful of straw into more of that perfect gold.

When Belle awakens, he will offer her a ring fashioned from what's in his heart, and beg her on his knees to be with him forever.

**Author's Note:**

> **None of my fanfiction may be reposted or otherwise shared elsewhere, including translations and audio recordings, unless you have my written consent. Using my occasional original ideas/characters in your own fanfic, to make your _own_ words or art or whatever, is fine with me.**


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